This Week on the Dining Table

The "Pandemic" Edition................

I did get out a bit last week(mostly to Rite-Aid while picking up Rxs)and out to Weis for some foodstuffs and Hubs went out to find a thermometer on Sunday(as ours was about 12 years old and dead).
Trying to limit social contact now and eating from the freezer because it's still darn full as you can see!

Moving On....

Onward to the meal planning-

This is what was planned for last week.......

1. Sunday--Salmon, leftover Mac and Cheese, Green Beans
2. Monday--Hamburgers or Cheeseburgers on Rolls, leftover assorted Veggies or Salad
3. Tuesday--Beef Stroganoff, Rice or Noodles, Salad

4. Wednesday--Fend for Yourself

5. Thursday--Hot Dogs and homemade Beans, Sweet Potato Fries

6. Friday--Pork Tenderloin Sandwiches, Veggie TBD
7. Saturday--I might make Chili for the guys or Tacos or ?

And this is what actually happened--

1. Sunday--Salmon, leftover Mac and Cheese, Green Beans
2. Monday--Cheeseburgers on Rolls, leftover assorted Veggies
3. Tuesday--Chinese Take-Out

4. Wednesday--Fend for Yourself

5. Thursday--Hot Dogs and homemade Beans, French Fries

6. Friday--Domino's Pizza, Salad
7. Saturday--Pork Tenderloins Sandwiches, leftover Tater Salad and Beans

Last week saw 4 nights of home cooked dinners, 1 nights of leftovers/FFY, and 2 nights of Eating Out/Take-Out.  No meals out obviously but some take-out happened.
The Stroganoff didn't happen because we only went to the local Weis and I just couldn't pull the trigger on full price(read overpriced)fresh mushrooms. ;-)

What got put into the freezer last week....
* 3 small tv dinners
* 3 pints of ice cream(yes we went to the grocery store for pandemic ice cream.....if I am cooped up with the family in this house I "need" emergency ice cream--and booze) ;-)

What got taken out of the freezer and used.....
* a big piece of Salmon
* 1 bag of green beans
* 1 pack of hot dogs
* 1 pack of pork chops

2 trips to Weis(PMITA)Markets this past week in the amount of $53.62(a lot of what was spent was for crappy cheap snacks, clearance drinks and toilet bowl cleaner beyond the necessities)brings my March Grand Total spending on food so far to $277.81.
No worries as we are below target for a $400 spend month.  I doubt we'll buy much more before March ends(if anything).

I've earned $32.15 in Ibotta rebates too in March so far.

My savings percentage last week was 27.74%(without Rite-Aid trips)and March's monthly savings total comes in at 52.42% so far(w/out R-A).   The savings rate took a hit but it was for a good cause, ice cream. ;-)

I have 8 more food shopping/spending days in March.

Leftovers going into this week.....1 bowl of Clam Chowder(and 2 Biscuits).

Here is this week's "food plan".....

1. Sunday--Ravioli and Meatballs, Salad
2. Monday--Tacos
3. Tuesday--Turkey, Mashed Potatoes, Asparagus

4. Wednesday--Chicken Enchiladas, Rice and Beans

5. Thursday--Beef Stroganoff, Rice, Roasted Carrots

6. Friday--small TV Dinners, Veggie TBD
7. Saturday--Broccoli Cheddar Soup

What needs buying for this menu?  I still need mushrooms and Hubs went off in search of cheese on Sunday.

What is getting fixed and served at your house this week?

Was last week's plan successful, did you go off plan or did you not even plan what was going to be eaten last week?

Any great deals on food at your stores this week?  

Sluggy

And the Winner Is...........

For whatever reason(preoccupation with virus prepping, folks not going online as much to stay away from fake news or headlines, not a lot of readers now who haven't won a giveaway, etc.)I had a mere NINE valid giveaway entries.
But don't worry, the giveaways will continue.

So I had Random dotorg pick at random(duh!)the winner this month.
And that person is..............

Tebble!

AnonymousMarch 21, 2020 at 3:45 PM

I haven’t won yet but I love trying! Spring plans have been put on hold with this dang virus. Our youngest is a Junior and his soccer games consume our Spring. They have been canceled and we’re all snuggled at home together Lord help me! 😁. Tebble tebblestearns@yahoo.com

Congratulations Tebble!!
Please email me your complete mailing address and I'll get this out to you asap.

Please email me within 48 hours of this post going live or I'll have to pick another winner.

Thanks to everyone who played along this month.

The April Giveaway will be going live in the first week of the month(hopefully)and it will be open to ALL readers.

Now go wash your hands and stay safe!

Sluggy

Our January Trip to Louisiana....Part 3

Part 1 of our trip is HERE.
Part 2 of our trip is HERE.

About that other church..........

I had waatched a documentary on Youtube about the Malbis Plantation in Baldwin County Alabama about a year ago.

Here it is for your viewing pleasure in case you have time stuck at home lately with nothing better to do than to learn something.........



The church was a true work of art and I will intersperse photos I took inside with the information below.

In 1906 two men, Jason Malbis and William Papageorge came from Greece to Alabama(via Chicago) to found a colony of Greek immigrants.  Called the Malbis plantation it survived for many years and brought many Greeks here to live communally on the land.

Jason Malbis was born in Doumena Greece as Antonioa Markopoulos and spent the first half of his life as a monk in Greece.  He came to Chicago in 1900, changed his name to Jason Malbis and began looking for land to start an agricultural community like he knew back in the Old Country.  Malbis and Papageorge settled on acreage they bought in Daphne Alabama on which to found their dream.
The Malbis Plantation was a self-contained and self-sufficient community well into the 1970's.

Jason Malbis was on a trip back to Greece in 1939 when war broke out, trapping him there and in 1942 Malbis unexpectedly died, never to return to his community in Alabama.  He had left instructions in his will that a grand church dedicated to Mary, the Mother of Jesus("Theotokos" in Greek), should be built on their land and it was.

 It took 15+ years to raise the money needed but a church was erected, which was known as the Sacred Patriarchal and Stavropegial Monastery of the Presentation of Theotokos(or Presentation Theotokos)opening in 1965.

While the original community of Malbis Plantation eventually dissolved as people died off and/or moved away(the last original member of the community passed away in 2008)this Greek Orthodox Church stands as a testament to Jason Malbis' dream.

This is only one of six Greek Orthodox Churches in Alabama and the only one not under the  authority of the Green Orthodox Archdiocese of American but under the authority of the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

It has no active congregation but special religious holidays and observances are held here as well as weddings.  There is a psaltist(chantor)from Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church located in nearby Mobile Alabama who gives tours of the Malbis Memorial Church but we weren't there on a day he gives tours.  That would have been a lot of fun to have a tour.

This Byzantine architecture Greek Orthodox church was dedicated in 1965 as a tribute to Jason Malbis and has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 2011 and on the Alabama Commission of Historic Buildings since 1977.

The Malbis Church is truly a gem of Byzantine art. Skilled laborers and artists(mostly from Greece) took five years to complete it.   Here is a portrait near the back of the nave of the church, of the church building, with parishioners entering and Jesus and his disciples depicted in the heavens above.

The walls are filled with iconography.  In the Greek Orthodox religion icons are of saints who are venerated not worshiped(that's reserved for God alone).  Veneration can take the form of bowing before them, kissing them, or standing and offering gestures of pious respect.

The Sanctuary and wall in front of  it were exquisitely beautiful by themselves.  This area is reserved for the clergy and can only be entered with the priest's blessing and to perform a specific task.  There was a wooden door with a circular opening so you could peek into this most holy of areas of the church where the holy table is housed.

This pulpit(or Ambon in the Greek Orthodox religion)was raised up(much like I've seen in some English Protestant churches)and intricately carved marble imported from Greece.

Also noteworthy was this carved throne sitting off opposite the Ambon to the right of the Sanctuary.  I didn't get a photo of the whole throne just this detail of one of the peacocks flanking it's sides.  I believe this is called the Bishop's throne and reserved for visiting clergy of high authority like a Bishop.  It is said the marble used in Malbis Memorial Church was mined from the same quarry that was used in Ancient Greece to build the Parthenon.

We went up into the balcony and here's a wide shot of the whole interior, or as much of it as I could get.

One think we all noticed in this church--all the stained glass was not representational, meaning it didn't depict any thing or person.  They were all geometric shapes inspired by Byzantine art.
Those massive pillars look like marble but upon closer inspection they are trompe l'oeil(literally "fool the eye" in French),painted to resemble marble.
The church both inside and out was also adorned with painstakingly created mosaics which I couldn't get good photos of unfortunately.

This small shrine/altar to the right of the sanctuary is dedicated to Jason Malbis and his body is interred behind it in the sanctuary.

But the crowning glory of Presentation Theotokos Church is the dome of the church in the center over the nave.  This artwork was created by an Iconographer from Athens, Greece named Spyros Tziouvaras, along with Haralambos and Chris Tziouvaras.  The dome depicts the artist's interpretation of the "Pantocrator" which in Greek means "the Holder of All Things" or God).

I knew Lorraine, being an artist herself, would enjoy a trip to this gem of a church in her town and Hubs is always up for anything involving religion.
So it was a great way to spend some time on a mild January day in coastal Alabama while we waited for Chris to get off work for the day.

Sluggy

Last Chance Giveaway!

Today is the last day to enter the current Giveaway.

Go HERE to enter before 11:59 pm EDST.

I've only got 4 valid entries so far.  Someone called Kath Mattus also entered but there is no contact info on her Blogger page so she needs to email me her info if she wants her entry to be valid.

I am thinking there are almost no entries this go round because A-I limited to folks who haven't won yet and B-everyone is so preoccupied with the Pandemic.  I am not seeing many posts from other bloggers lately either.

And nobody who has entered has come back and put in entries every day either.

Maybe I should stop running these giveaways?
Let me know what you think.....

Sluggy

Frugal Friday......the March 20th Edition

Well staying home more means less frugality of the "out and about" variety but staying home lends itself to another type of frugality.  It's hard to spend money(except online)if you stay home, right?

This virus is forcing a level of frugalness on us all which can't be a bad thing. ;-)

* I got the Freebie at Weis(PMITA)Markets last Friday............

A bag of frozen French fries.  I nabbed this photo from online since I don't feel like digging my bag out of the chest freezer. lolz
I just got word that Friday Freebies are suspended until further notice.....Weis has instituted "Marshall Law" of sorts as they try to keep the store shelves stocked.  No doubling coupons, no returns and strict limits on items.
Madness I say, Madness!! ;-)

* I found money!

A dime and a penny both found at Weis on Friday.  The dime was over by an end cap near the laundry detergent aisle and the penny by my favorite self-checkout.

These 2 dimes and 1 penny were found at Rite-Aid on Sunday......one dime by the register up front, a penny down an aisle and then another dime under the candy rack up front by the register when I was leaving the store.

After Rite-Aid I went to Weis(PMITA)Markets and it was more crowded than I have ever seen it.
Panic buying must mean more folks not paying attention to their change because I found 4 pennies at various places in the store--1 by the CS desk, 2 by the self-checkouts and 1 penny at the end of the regular checkouts on the way out of the store.

Then on Wednesday I found this dime at Rite-Aid when I went to pick up an Rx.  It was standing on it's end under the shelf where the weekly ads are kept, beckoning to me.

Please note-since last week I've kept an antibacterial wipe in my pocket and I use that to pick up any found change.  All change gets a thorough washing/scrubbing with soap and water once I get it home.  No point in not taking precautions.  ;-)

Found Money This Week...... .46¢
Found Money This Year so far....$44.27

*  I earned $1.00 on SavingStar and $11.10 on Ibotta in the last week.

*  This finally arrived last week too............

My P and G $15 debit card from the December Rebate Period.
yay me.
I am still waiting on my February Rite-Aid $20 Debit Card.

*  Gas has dropped here dramatically.  The best deal since I have a Sunoco card was there.  It's $2.25 but I get a .05¢ discount so $2.20 per gallon.  That's better than the Turkey Hill($2.23)and Weis($2.21 if I didn't use my Weis points there).  Gas was $2.69 at Sunoco just 2 weeks ago so I am loving this .49¢ per gallon discount.

*  I got some deals since last Friday which I blogged about already............
At Weis--

Various transactions at Rite-Aid--

*  There was no lunch out this week and everyone should know why. All restaurants are closed here except for a few that are doing take-out.  One of our two Chinese take-out places has also closed.  If you can afford to buy a gift certificate or get take-out from your local restaurants please support them.  They are hurting for business right now.  ;-)

*  I had to go to Weis on Wednesday but I spent as little time there as possible(along with my Lysol wipes.....the cart wipes thingy at the entrance was empty so I am glad I had wipes on me!).

This was the beer/wine cafe area by the ready to eat foods and salad bar......all the tables and chairs were gone so no one could eat there.

My asparagus rang up $3.99 lb. instead of the ad/posted price of .99¢ lb.  So I did have to walk back through the store and take a photo of the sign to get my money back.  I did hesitate because of this health stuff but the frugal force was stronger(and I didn't encounter any people on this walk through the produce section).  If it had only been a few cents I might have let it go but it was $3.13!

*  I got a temp. Census Bureau job but they have suspended operations until April 1st so we'll see then how this plays out. It pays $17 hr. + .57¢ mileage here so not bad. The door-to-door enumerator jobs may go away totally or just get pushed back into this Summer thought or whenever the pandemic ends.  If they want someone to schlep around in the Summer heat, I am not that gal. lolz

*  And finally I am sooo glad I don't live in a tiny house at this point in time.  If so, I would be in prison for murdering either Hubs and/or Ex-College Box.
I thought I had misplaced my last nerve but Wait!.....they found it!!! 8-P

That's it for this week.

And a reminder.............

Any frugal wins in your life this past week?


Sluggy